Adiba Nelson

“Why would you do that? You have a daughter. Why would you put yourself in that position?”

The universe always knows, and so what it does in all its lovely knowing, is it clears a path for you. When the universe sees that things have reached the point where they stand to steer you off your path, it will clear a way for you to continue moving onward and upward.

It’s insane the number of ways people want to pigeonhole, categorize, and ultimately TEAR DOWN women. What’s even worse is that we, as women, buy into it. We run around in T-shirts that say “Real Women Do XYZ” or “Real Women ARE XYZ.” We post these memes and quotes and think they’re funny, but what are we really doing?

I applaud you for being here. I applaud you for giving life the five fingers of death and deciding to show up for whatever the day brings — every day.

Then we had that talk that made my eye twitch: the budget talk.

There wasn’t going to be any sparkle. There wasn’t going to be any new mommy magic.

They basically gave the Oscars the middle finger.

Let me tell you something, ladies. There are a million people in this world ready to tear you down at any given moment, for reasons they know, and reasons they don’t know. They will all but sell the blood of their firstborn child to make sure you know that they think you ain’t shit.

Black women have endured the unfathomable. We’ve watched our leaders be assassinated, and our hopes go with them. We’ve watched the nation’s leaders be assassinated, and watched our hopes float away with them too. We’ve buried our 5-year-old daughters after they were bombed to death in church, our 12-year-old sons who were playing in the park, and our 29-year-old daughters who were stopped for simple traffic violations.

This book is real, folks. As well it should be –– it was written by one of the realest women on the planet.